


Ang Laga De

by sanchari (s_h_y)



Category: Mahabharata - Vyasa
Genre: Implied Sexual Content, inaccurate depictions of sari draping, only mild smut aunty i swear
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-22
Updated: 2020-08-22
Packaged: 2021-03-06 19:47:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26044462
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/s_h_y/pseuds/sanchari
Summary: no prizes for guessing what i was listening to on LOOP while i wrote this
Relationships: Arjuna/Draupadi (Mahabharata)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 14
Collections: Hindu Mythology Event





	Ang Laga De

**Author's Note:**

> no prizes for guessing what i was listening to on LOOP while i wrote this

Once upon a time there was a prince. He was brave and strong, a peerless warrior, the whole world knew his name. Allies celebrated him and enemies feared him, and he knew it. Even the gods respected his prowess.

Arjuna has been telling himself this story for years, since he was a boy, since before he even learned to string a bow. For years. It was always supposed to go a certain way – sure, there have been a few detours so far, a few pitfalls, but still, _this_ is one that he doesn’t know how to…reconcile.

 _One day the man went to the heavens themselves, and on the advice of Indra, took a few music and dance lessons to broaden his horizons. One day, for once in his life, he_ refused _a woman’s advances (she was, in a way, his grandmother). One day, that woman cursed the man to become, well not a man._

It doesn’t really work.

Classic hero stories aren’t the best fit for him.

***

Arjuna simply forces down the embarrassment, when the change takes effect. Just shoves it aside and refuses to look it in the eye. _This is an advantage,_ he reminds himself over and over. _It’s strategy._

It’s…humiliating.

He stops and sighs. The _sari_ is tied all wrong, again. (is ‘he’ the right word anymore? It still feels that way, but is that just habit? Even if it’s not, is that going to change? He hasn’t ever been anything other than a boy or a man. Is he going to earn it anew? Did he ever _learn_ to begin with? He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t know.)

He drops the end of fabric he’s holding and stares into the mirror. He woke up this morning to find his face nearly clear of hair, save for a few wisps that are somehow worse than being clean-shaven would have been. His body is shaped differently now, hips swelling out just a little more, waist dipping in a shade more than it used to. It’s nothing major, he tells himself. After all, it’s not like castration can change that much about the – the rest of his body.

It’s an advantage. It’s strategy.

Right.

There is, however, the issue of the sari.

“Panchali,” he says quietly later, when he gets a moment with her alone. “I need your help.”

Panchali glances up, curious. “With what?”

“With – “he sighs. “With tying a sari.”

She blinks, and he watches the realization dawn. “Oh.” She doesn’t laugh at him, for which he is grateful. “Come with me.”

She leads him to a spot away from the rest, picks up the sari that he left on the ground in a twisted, frustrated mess, and shakes it out.

“Alright.” She takes one end and lets the rest drop. “Stand still.”

Arjuna stops pacing and turns to face her.

***

Kṛṣṇā has never done this before.

Helping someone dress, that is. By the time she was born, she was her father’s only daughter, and it’s not like Dhrishtadyumna wore saris. She had maids, as a teenager, who wrapped and pulled and tucked them into place, until she too knew the process by heart. But _this_ is a first.

Arjuna stands watching her. This self-consciousness is a strange, new, thing on him. It drapes itself in the slight droop of his shoulders, the dip of his neck. The way his gaze flickers away from hers. She steps closer and holds the edge of the fabric against his waist. It’s a faded, dusty blue color, oddly beautiful against his dark skin. Silently, she slips her fingers into the waist of his dhoti, tucking the sari in, straightening out the folds so it lies flat against him, feeling the way his breath stutters at her touch. The light is beginning to fade now, and the first birds are starting to twitter. They’ll have to light a lamp soon. Kṛṣṇā slowly begins to walk around her husband, sari in hand, creating the first layer of the skirt.

“What difference did it make?” she asks. “Her curse?”

Arjuna laughs softly and looks back at her over his shoulder. “Can’t you tell?”

She stops and looks at him, actually looks. His shoulders seem the same, broad as ever, perhaps sloping a little more – could that just be his posture? His outline curves in to form the same firm, narrow waist, _maybe_ a shade smaller than it used to be, flaring out into hips a little more like her own. Her hand reaches out unthinkingly, brushing against his ribs, following the gentle curve there. God. A familiar warmth seeps into her fingertips, and she hesitates for a second, two, before drawing her hand away again.

She knows she felt his breathing quickening, too. God.

She comes back around and stops in front of him. The rest of the fabric pools at his feet, and she picks more of it up now as she moves closer again. Arjuna stays immobile, as if he’s afraid he’ll ruin it by moving so much as a limb. Kṛṣṇā breaks into a laugh.

Arjuna glances up at her, surprised, mouth pulling slowly into an uncertain smile. “What?”

 _“You.”_ She reaches forward again, and then stops to snort again. “Relax. It’s a piece of clothing, not – a punishment or something – you’ve been standing there like I’m putting you in chains.”

Arjuna scoffs back at her, but his shoulders loosen. “You’re the one who told me to hold still.”

“Because you were pacing like a caged lion. What’s the matter with you?”

His gaze drops as he shrugs half-heartedly. “Nothing. Just…this, it’s not – I’m not…used to it.”

Kṛṣṇā inclines her head slightly. “You’re mostly the same – “she begins, and then breaks off. Maybe that wasn’t what she meant to say. She leans forward thoughtfully, to wind the fabric around him a second time, and this time as she stands on her toes to look over his shoulder, he moves with her. One hand on her hip, when she sways a little. Turning to watch her face, brushing her hair, almost absentmindedly, from her eyes, so she can see what she’s doing. She pulls one end of the sari over his shoulder, just a little unsteadily. This close, she can feel his breathing, see the curl of his hair where it touches his shoulder. This close, she can feel the warmth of his skin, the faint scent of him. This close, she has only to turn her face –

“It’s not just that not much has changed,” she says, finding her words again. “You wear it well.” She doesn’t mean the sari alone, but his chin lifts just a little, and she knows she doesn’t need to spell it out. (Progress in itself.)

He gives her a long, steady look. “Then let’s hope that not much has to.”

Yes, but also no, for once she doesn’t want to think about any of that, not today. Today she wants only the feeling of worn cloth in her hands as she folds it over and over itself, only the sight of Arjuna and the way he is looking at her now. She has tired of thinking, of planning, of worrying, even – for once – of fantasizing of her revenge. Today, now, there is more than one thing worth desiring.

Kṛṣṇā smiles at him, wordless, and tucks the finished pleats in at the front of his dhoti. Lets her hand slide further down than it needs to. Leans up to kiss him once, slowly, gently, before she steps back to look at her work.

He's beautiful.

The soft blue, in the half-light of dusk, the way it winds around his frame, the way it looks against his skin. Something about his hair, his eyes, his collarbones, it hasn't changed so much as it stands out stronger now. 

Except that's not quite right,either. There is a change. She had been wrong before - suddenly she does not understand how she could have missed it earlier. There is something there that wasn't before, not weeks ago when he was still the old Arjuna, nor twenty minutes ago when he came to her with his request. Something in the way he stands, in the way he looks back at her. She is reminded, suddenly, that Arjuna is a dancer now. There's a grace to him, an expressiveness, a sense of surety. The sari falls from his limbs to the floor like he was born in it, hugging the tops of his legs, tapering briefly, it's pleats rustling, rising and falling, with every movement. With every breath he takes. He's beautiful. She's never seen anything like him in her life. 

The end drops down just past his ankles – thank god, it’s not too short – its faded gold border brushing against his feet. Like a curtain.

Something unfurls in the pit of Kṛṣṇā’s belly at the thought. A curtain. Her hands itch to part it.

“Alright,” she says at last, and if her throat happens to be a little drier when she speaks that’s nobody’s business but hers. “It’s just about – wait.”

“What?”

“The hem.” She steps forward again, and then, as Arjuna watches curiously, she sinks to her knees. Tugs at the border with her fingers, aligning it better to the floor –

“Kṛṣṇā,” says Arjuna. His voice is strained, too. She looks up at him, at how stares down at her, lips parted just a little, eyes very dark. “For fuck’s sake.”

For fuck’s sake.

Kṛṣṇā rises to her feet in one fluid motion, even as Arjuna’s hands find her arms, her jaw, her waist, as her chest presses against his, as his waiting mouth meets hers. 

(perhaps it was the “fuck” that did it)

Undoing, unravelling, is an easy, thoughtless thing to do. Shaping a sculpture from clay may take hours but to shatter such a thing takes a split second. Not even a heartbeat. Drawing, art, takes time, effort, but tearing that same portrait to shreds takes a blink. This sari, its tucks, its pleats, its hem, is almost a skill in its own right, but now, as Kṛṣṇā allows her body to overtake her mind, the reams of fabric come apart under her hands easier than breathing, faster than thought, dropping unwanted to the floor between their legs, the gold of its border standing out stark against the earth. Arjuna’s lips are chapped, grazing her skin just enough to burn as his mouth moves from her lips to her jaw to her neck to one breast – she gasps, nails scraping against the back of his head.

This is something else. Sex with a man she knows, and knows well. But sex with _this_ man, now, is – is –

“I don’t know –“ begins Arjuna, panting a little, fingers still tangled in her skirt, “I’m not sure how to –“

Kṛṣṇā lifts his chin, leaning down to kiss him roughly as she unties the skirt herself, as she pulls his dhoti the rest of the way off.

“Draupadi.” He actually laughs a little, even as his gaze is running over her, eyes not looking away once. She’s always loved this, the effect she has on him, on all five of them. “Kṛṣṇā. I mean it, I – “ he gestures briefly at himself, more amused than embarrassed. “I don’t have – I don’t know how to, I mean, what to –”

God, he can be so stupid at times. Kṛṣṇā laughs, too. Kisses him again. Takes his hand. Shows him.

***

“What were you going to call yourself, again?”

“Brihannala.”

“Well, Brihannala.” Her fingers trail lazily along his chest. “Well done.”

**Author's Note:**

> so, I did some research, and it turns out that eunuchs, or people who have been castrated, can in fact feel arousal at first, and up to a few weeks after castration. Also, although Brihannala seems to be female-presenting, the word eunuch/napunsakam seems to refer mainly to castrated men, and not necessarily intersex people, and so I decided not to portray Arjuna as having gone through a great deal of physical change (aside from the obvious). Lastly, I'm sorry for all the different ways I spell character's names across my works - that's mostly just me playing around with ~aesthetics~ and trying to figure out what I like best. 
> 
> (and i maintain that tying a sari, especially on someone else, is in fact a complex and time-consuming activity)


End file.
